Forum:31: Probability and Pandemonium
The group faced down the gigantic monstrous creature known as Pandemonium, the form from which all demons are wrought. Though an imposing creature, the real threat it posed to the party stemmed from its ability to observe and duplicate their attacks as a means of defending itself, rendering the party's own efforts to fight it useless. However, they took advantage of its inability to split its focus to attack simultaneously as one, and bypass its defences and vulnerability to all that is holy and lawful in order to destroy it. Over the course of the battle, however, the creature forced the party to relive many painful memories of Detri's existence, including fighting in wars past, being hurt by and then later killing a man he admired as his mentor, and finally offering his identity as a sacrifice to Genbu to dull the pain. These shocks of consciousness gave the party pause and the psychic assault very nearly killed some of them, but assistance was provided by the Lexington father and son, and a mysterious short and blue-haired man that Genbu sent to extract Dr. Vavilov and provide assistance to the group. Ten-Tongues, struck by many of the Pandemonium's psychic assaults, took some time to realize that the man was actually him, or the idealized form of which he had always thought himself deprived. Though the battle was disorienting and painful, the group eventually won out, and the creature dissolved into light. The group re-emerged in some sort of conference room of Genbu's where Ten Tongues tried to strike at the other version of himself, but he was able to dodge his own attack before Lin restrained him. Genbu arrived shortly thereafter and offered his congratulations to the party, and then informed them that he would give them a reward in the form of an opportunity to sit and talk to their liking with the God of knowledge. The party could only speak one at a time, but they could talk to their liking about anything they wanted. Artyom was the first speaker, and Genbu reiterated his congratulations for returning to the country and ruining the last vestiges of elven social order. Artyom claimed that the arc of history was long and that this would have come to pass regardless of Genbu's own interventions, and Genbu responded that Artyom was underestimating Genbu's own agency and ability to predict and control the destiny of the country. He went on to claim that the only reason that the Snezhnians proceeded with the potentially catastrophic Lumenated bomb plot in the first place was due to their refusal to listed to Genbu's advice and the party's role in the plot was that of an object lesson to Snezhny: that Genbu could maintain control. Artyom maintained his disagreement, and Genbu said that he would take no offence if Artyom ever asks for advice on how to better direct his country's future. Yahtuh spoke of the ease with which he returned to the battlefield, and Genbu informed him that the son of his old unit's leader was looking for him, and would most likely not allow him to avoid spilling blood once more. However, he also said that "two women in high towers" were interested in providing him with guidance, and that he may find an alternative to the fearsome blackness that resides in his stomach if ever he wants to avoid simply becoming a killing machine. Lin spoke of her admiration for and disappointment in the world after seeing it for the first time, and Genbu told her that she may not feel that way after she goes home and sees what has changed in her absence. He also told her that his hateful nature is a result of resentment towards humanity for needing his guidance but ultimately deciding to go against it as often as they accede to it, and resenting him as a tyrant when he intervenes directly to keep humanity as a whole safe when necessary. As such, while he hates humanity and derives pleasure from the pain of making individual humans suffer, he is duty-bound to protect humanity as a whole and tells Lin that his small torments are in the service of a much greater number. The two Lexingtons spoke briefly, where the Senior confirmed that his compulsion to betray his country was engineered by Vavilov, and the Junior was satisfied with insulting the sadistic god to his face before being ejected from the room. Finally, Ten Tongues was offered his opportunity to speak, and Genbu went on to explain his part in Ten Tongues' suffering: As a child, Genbu had used the art of Soul Severance to divide Ten Tongues into two bodies, one of which had "Form", or the idealized body, while the other would be deprived of it. The deprived one would live in the human realm, while the other trained under Genbu in Negative Space. The two would influence each other and gain each other's understanding, so while the Ten Tongues in the human realm gained experience and knowledge, the one under Genbu would offer the baseline of information and data gleamed from his training that would allow them both to grow, essentially doing the work of two minds simultaneously. As such, Genbu informed Ten Tongues that he was responsible for blessing Ten Tongues quite directly with the knowledge necessary to become so powerful in such a short time, but that any thought of rebellion against Genbu would be pointless as the other one would become aware of it. He went on to explain that this control was also present in other aspects of the adventuring party. Their quest to free Snezhny was a by-product of Genbu's goal to rid the world of Nordium and thus the possibility of destruction through lumenation. Furthermore, Hafuujou's presence was also of his design, as his control over dimensional travel allowed him to engineer the circumstances under which the party met the Lordly Raven in the first place, and Genbu forced the Lordly Raven to assist the party and keep Hafuujou from interfering more directly with Terestrahl. The Lordly Raven even admitted to his part in the plan, and Genbu laughed that he had only become richer for it before telling him that Terestrahl had no need of Hafuujou. Finally, he said that the group had only a little time left to undertake Vavilov's request of rescuing the other "children" from Gray Peak, and that in a few moments the world would be free of the threat of lumenation. When the party returned to Gray Peak, they found that the battle had damaged the coolant tanks in the Nordium reactor and that it would fail catastrophically in a few minutes, and if it did, not only would the area become lumenated, but the tanks holding the children would fail to oxygenate and the occupants would die. The group as a majority elected to go save the children, but Ten Tongues had a conundrum: Realizing that the Nordium presently in the reactor was the only one he would be able to access and the only way he could think of defying Genbu's will absolutely, he struggled with the thought of going back to retrieve it and defying his fate once and for all. However, the rest of the group indicated that he was only playing into Genbu's hands and would likely die in the attempt. Despite the voices of his darker nature telling him to retrieve the Nordium and take his revenge, Ten Tongues instead relinquished his judgement and the crossbow to Lin and said that he would take a step back in his plan for vengeance, as his own judgement had proven to be flawed and untrustworthy. Subsequently, the group extracted the children (full-fledged soldiers in their own right) and dealt with Depyat one more time before escaping Gray Peak just as the reactor room exploded with lumenated steam. Ten Tongues saw a vision of himself proceeding with his original plan, and failing to escape before the reactor explosion, thus vindicating his decision, and the rest of the group celebrated the fact, as best they could, that Vavilov and the children were safe and Snezhny was now one more step closer to being safe... Rewards are as follows: *15,000 EXP each for the elimination of Pandemonium Alpha and granted by the grace of Genbu, God of Knowledge, Truth, and Lies. *One maplewood metronome, broken, but functioning as a phylactery keeping a lich alive. *One uniform and various medals, belonging to Gen. Zinoviy Kalnov, CIC, dec.